Main Menu

Kinit Her ‎– The Poet & The Blue Flower [English/Polish]

ENG: Kinit Her is a musical embodiment of Nathaniel Ritter and Troy Schafer, assisted from time to time by other musicians. Since 2006 they’ve released over ten albums, for such labels as Small Doses, Paradigms Recordings or Reue Um Reue among others. The disc that we’re going to discuss right here, right now, “The Poet And The Blue Flower”, was released on CD via Brave Mysteries while the Italian label Avant! Records is responsible for the vinyl version, with which I’ve had the opportunity to familiarize myself.

If I had to describe the music in this album in one word, I’d say ‘neofolk’. Except that in this case pigeonholing becomes a bit irrelevant. So what if I describe “The Poet & The Blue Flower” in a way so that anyone reading this keyword expects another Death In June clone, while such a big surprise is given him later on. Is it a pleasant surprise, or perhaps the contrary? Well, it’s a subject for discussion.

Even the short intro caught me with my pants down – “Feast Of Death I” refers to the French chanson tradition, while the title track is a sort of quasimedieval song, except that it overwhelms the listener with an authentic storm of sounds. It’s heavy like a doom metal steam roller; if let’s say Esoteric or Skepticism exchanged their electric guitars with medieval instruments, this is what their music would probably sound like. The third track, “Reconcile” is shorter, it seems lighter and more airy, but these are just appearances as the acoustic guitars strike a sensitive chord and the suppressed rage and despair hidden in the vocals fills the background, painting a very emotional picture. For me it’s the best song on this release. “Silence, My Song I”, a two-minute miniature, closes the first part of the vinyl and forces you to quickly swap it on side B.

As you might imagine “Feast Of Death II” is a continuation of the opening part of the disc. The dueling vocals of both Kinit Her members are probably the most impressive element in “As Old As Day And Night Together”, another fairly depressing piece musically referring to works created several centuries ago. Further down the track the string instruments are riffing in an almost Sunn O))) kind of way. A little more light is hidden in “A Dome Surrounds” heralding the imminent finale of the album. The cheerful nature of both vocals and violins gives a sense of hope for a better tomorrow. A similar situation occurs with the last fragment, “Silence, My Song II”.

This doesn’t change the fact that the general tone of the album is heavily pessimistic. Lyrically Kinit Her refers to post-Romantic German poetry from the beginning of the last century. In conjunction with the music this creates a severe and shattering, but quite interesting conglomerate. Neofolk? Yeah, probably, but it’s the kind that certain experimenters and enthusiasts of overwhelmingly morbid doom romance would find more interesting, rather than fans of runes and such. One may like it, or not, but to refuse Kinit Her its originality is impossible.